Jimmy owns a full service car wash. He spends a lot of time on Facebook. Mostly, he’s lurking and spying on people who want to be noticed. But he’s trying to convince everyone (including his seriously suspicious wife) that he’s mastering social medial marketing. Jimmy …

Sometimes I speak with business owners who brag about not advertising or marketing their business as if it is a sign of success. Here’s the thing. If you don’t tell a prospective customer about your years of experience, premium products, warranties and guarantees, certifications, insurance, …

Lisa is one of my publisher’s representatives. Her job is to help businesses in small towns by advertising their products and services in our community directories and service guides To the uninformed, Lisa sells advertising, but don’t be deceived. She is magic. I don’t mean …

I was speaking with Charles Laughlin, an analyst with BIA/Kelsey and he offered one of his typically brilliant insights. I was preparing for my presentation at the Association of Directory Publishers annual conference. My charge is to provide a positive sendoff to directory publishers and …

Advertising used to be simple. The advertiser took all the risk, and the agency and publishers and media companies focused on delivering audience. But the risk of advertising is shifting away from the advertiser buying audience. This shift began with guaranteed delivery of impressions. Web …

People don’t follow listeners. They follow leaders. Moses didn’t come down and say. “What can I do to help you?” Jesus didn’t ask people for their opinion. Steve Jobs (no relation to the two aforementioned leaders) didn’t ask people if they wanted a product they …

Ultimate Health and Fitness in Sandwich, IL is having a blast with their text marketing program! Julie the owner sent out her first text yesterday (after making a bet with her daughter on how fast the response would be) for $45 off a package of …

We’ve been carefully watching our beauty salon clients using our text marketing services and we’ve noticed a couple of very important items. Give a Gift for Subscribing When you offer a free gift as an instant reward for subscribing, you get many more subscribers. Duh! …

Presidents Day, and many other quasi holidays are often slow times for restaurants that serve business lunches. The restaurant is open, but their business is 50% lower than on a typical day. Offering an outrageous deal to loyal customers to bring them in can turn …